A map of modern (year 80 Pa) Panoulis.
Panoulis is the name given to the central part of the world that is enclosed by the elemental planes. Notable areas within Panoulis are Antrissa, the Avylonian Kingdoms, the Polis and Atrum Academia, and the Fahldenn ocean.
History[]
Records of Panoulis' history indicate that it is at least three to four millennia old, and many religious accounts assert that it is far older. Accounts of how it came to be vary widely from source to source.
Ocrisian Empire[]
The Ocrisian Empire reigned for nearly a thousand years before its fall 900 years before the Plague. The Ocrisians who conquered and ruled the empire were a race about which little is now known, but they are generally believed to have been a race of mostly well-preserved undead with purple skin, practically infinite natural lifespans, and emaciated bodies. Unsurprisingly, the Ocrisians were skilled necromancers, and conquered their foes with armies consisting of former foes.
The Ocrisians placed their capitol, Polis Sarn ("the White City"), where the Polis Academia now stands. Other major cities included Atrum Sarn, Rubir Sarn, Anlulan Sarn, and Serseran Sarn - each of which was later made home to one of the Academies of magic - as well as Crusrek, Antriss (from which Antrissa takes its name), Akerek, Avydos, and Cendiss (from which the Cendizan Empire takes its name).
The Ocrisians became fewer and fewer as time went on, and soon new Ocrisians stopped appearing for unknown reasons. The remaining Ocrisians ruled for a time, but eventually perished altogether, and non-Ocrisians began governing the empire. Emboldened by the disappearance of the Ocrisians and their undead armies, the various holdings of the empire began squabbling among themselves and tore the empire to pieces, thus ending the Ocrisian empire.
Age of Isolation[]
After the fall of the Ocrisian empire, large states tended to splinter into smaller and smaller pieces until most of Panoulis' civilizations were city-states under no rule but their own. The Humans laid claim to central Panoulis, their homelands, leaving the other races their homelands at its outskirts. The Elves, Dwarves, and Giants returned to the southwest, the Shadowfolk returned to the northwest, the Faeries returned to the northeast, and the Chimeric races returned to the southeast.
The now-isolated races, excepting the Humans, lived in relative peace under similarly fragmented governments. While most human powers during this period existed in the form of self-reliant city states, a great warrior known as Rigurd Iron-Eyes united the warring tribes and bickering city states lying in the northern reaches of central Panoulis, in and around the Stormshield Mountains, thus forming the kingdom of Torslowe. It stood as the single united power of humanity until the rise of the Avylonian Empire several generations later.
The Shadowfolk renamed the fortress Antriss to Dogwert, and began calling their ruling body Antrissa for the fortress. Atrum Sarn became a hotspot for those seeking to uncover the secrets of the Ocrisian necromancers, and the capitol Tol was built. They alone lived under a single government.
Approximately five hundred years after the fall of the Ocrisian Empire, the Elves, Dwarves, and Giants began colluding to plan the invasion of central Panoulis. This group named itself the Legion of Avylon, taking their name from an old term for Paradise or Heaven, and began amassing armies in secret.
Avylonian Empire []
When the Avylonians felt the time was ready, they marched north to the Imitrine river, and built the fortress Gilnae nearby as a launching point for the invasion before striking northeast. The Human city-states fell one by one, as many were unwilling to lend aid to rival city-states against such a powerful foe. What cooperation among the Human civilizations formed was too little and too late.
The victorious Avylonians styled themselves the Avylonian Empire, and ruled from the Titanic Mountains to the borders of Torslowe and from the Western Lake to Lake Avydos.
The Avylonians made several halfhearted attempts to conquer the Fae Forests and The Ironwood, but were dissuaded by the vicious beasts lurking there. They also attempted to conquer The Wastes, but the powerful magic and wicked cunning of the Shadowfolk repelled the invaders. Similiar conflicts againt Torslowe ended in mostly pyyrhic victories, and they were never able to conquer the northern kingdom. After these attempts, the Avylonians resigned themselves to the title of second largest empire of all time.
With its borders solidified, the Empire began focusing on improving its infrastructure and body of knowledge, and founded the Polis Academia where the mostly-abandoned Polis Sarn stood.
A map of Panoulis, just after the Plague.
The Avylonian Empire was felled by a catastrophic pandemic known only as the Plague. The chaos brought by the Plague heralded the end of the Avylonian Empire's four hundred year reign.
The Age of Heroes[]
The Polis Academia declared a new age with the fall of the Avylonian Empire, and created a new date system placing the year 0 at the year the Plague subsided. Just as after the Ocrisian Empire fell, the former holdings of the Avylonian Empire splintered until the majority of Panoulis was mere city-states.
As time passed, new governments began forming. The Loranne, a loose conglomeration of small villages, cropped up on the northwestern edge of Sorrowspine; Antrissa styled itself the Antrissan Empire and expanded into the Phlegethon Desert and the Windswept Plains; and a group of city-states near Lake Avydos declared themselves the Cendizan Empire.
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The geography of Panoulis |
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Regions |
Greater: Windswept Plains ▪ Burning Desert ▪ Titanic Mountains ▪ Avylon ▪ The Wastes ▪ Phlegethon desert |
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Water bodies: Godsmirror ▪ Fahldenn ocean ▪ Lake Avydos ▪ Western Lake ▪ Shadowed Sea |
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